Last week, Official Xbox Magazine revealed that the upcoming Tomb Raider reboot is going to ship with a multiplayer mode. As is often the case when doggedly single player franchises suddenly gain multiplayer features, the reaction from the gaming community was mixed. While the multiplayer mode may leave its mark on Tomb Raider's budget, it won't divert effort away from the game's single player campaign, as they're being handled by two separate teams. In this case, the multiplayer component is being developed by Thief 4 and Deus Ex: Human Revolution developer, Eidos Montreal. The single player is being developed by Crystal Dynamics.

Details about the recently announced multiplayer components are scarce, though a listing from UK retailer, GAME, seems to indicate that there may be more to it than a straight up deathmatch.

"Survive as a Team: Play a variety of multiplayer modes as Lara's Shipmates or Yamatai's Scavengers," read the listing, which has since been removed. "Yamatai" is the island Lara finds herself stranded on in the single player campaign.

Tomb Raider will be the first game in the main Tomb Raider series to feature multiplayer. That being said, 2010's download-only spinoff, Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, did feature an excellent co-op campaign.

You can expect a more detailed look at Tomb Raider's multiplayer mode in the February Issue of OXM and at the Consumer Electronics Show, this month.

This game is getting worse and worse the more I see of it. PC Gamer's insightful preview (the title, "a lack of meaningful interaction," goes most of the way to explaining the worst of it) proved most telling of its shallowness - it looks like a less spectacular Uncharted. Certainly not got high hopes for it, and I wasn't expecting much from the outset anyway, but... Christ. Shoehorned multiplayer now, too? Not to overuse the phrase, but I never asked for this.

Sacman:Heh, here's a good idea, get a team most famous for a game that prided itself on not having multiplayer to make the multiplayer component of a game that shouldn't have multiplayer to begin with...<.<

I still wonder what kind of business logic game publishers use these days.Oh right! the bulls**t one!

Forgetting that this doesn't make much sense from a game standpoint, I don't see how this makes sense from a business standpoint. I like the tomb raider games and thought Underworld was excellent. Articles came out that said it sold OK but didn't meet sales expectations. I always thought them trying to port it to every platform under sun and then expecting it sell as well on each was just shooting themselves in the foot. This is what? The third reboot of the franchise? Angel of Darkness tried to do something different, then Legend, now this. Maybe they should try to go smaller and spend less money instead of trying to restart by throwing in the kitchen sink everytime. Some kind of Underworld less actiony GoL hybrid I bet would be slick. I thought GoL did well given its budget. I never saw sales numbers but the response certainly seemed positive.

I also think its a bit puzzling they have a team responsible for a now proven commercial and critical reboot working on an unwanted feature to a franchise that has now failed to reboot twice. I can't help but think (even as much as I'd like to see another good tomb raider game) that time and money would be better invested in a followup to DX: HR which would probably end up selling more and be better received than another tomb raider reboot anyway.

Sacman:Heh, here's a good idea, get a team most famous for a game that prided itself on not having multiplayer to make the multiplayer component of a game that shouldn't have multiplayer to begin with...<.<

Square Enix owns both studios, it's possible that the new Tomb Raider is using the Deus Ex: HR engine. Since most likely the sequel to Deus Ex:HR will include MP, they took the portion of the team that developed the MP part of the next Deus Ex and put it in Tomb Raider as well.

So instead of diverting time, money and resources form the Tomb Raider game they are diverting time, money and resources from a dev team that hasn't done multiplayer before and is already working on a game that's got allot more interest than a reboot.

mixed reaction indeed. in the tomb raider forum, some people are actually happy that it has MP, wile others, like me, are not very happy about it. im glad that it will have nothing to do with the SP and that a different company is working on it but a MP just doesnt fit. but then again, when i think about max payne 3, it also had MP but it had nothing to do with the SP. and the SP was a solid fun, story driven campaign that it made play it several times.

I really think in this day and age when you can get almost any type of game on any kind of device that notion of "games sell more with multiplayer" is extremely dated. Games with _good_ and specific types of multiplayer may sell more than games without but the truth is most added on multiplayer is a rehash of tried and true game modes that are better represented in games dedicated to that kind of play.

BioShock 2 MP didn't seem to catch the world on fire. Neither did assassins creed MP or mass effect 3's offering. Sure people play them but its niche and I bet the percentage of people who picked those games up because they had MP was minuscule.

Spending that kind of labor, time and money for a box bullet point just seems inefficient to me. I think there are better bullet points out there that would sell more games.

I really think in this day and age when you can get almost any type of game on any kind of device that notion of "games sell more with multiplayer" is extremely dated. Games with _good_ and specific types of multiplayer may sell more than games without...

And if they bothered to understand the market they would have found that out, however CEO's of big companies use metrics exclusively and metrics show that WoW, CoD and Battlefield are making loads and loads of money on the basis of their multiplayer.

Who in there right mind thought the dev team behind a very successful single player game was the right choice to make a tacked on multiplayer mode? How is that an effective use of a talented studio? Especially since they are already working on Thief 4.

My interest in the game has more or less dropped to zero. It was only on the fence before, but I seriously believe that unless multiplayer is a large focus (like Halo and COD) then it is almost always a detriment to the single player. I do not believe the idea that a separate team working on it is a reason for it not to be. Resources and staff are finite, every dollar being spent on MP is a dollar that could go towards working on the main game.

If the single player turns out to be absolutely amazing then it won't be an issue, but I honestly cannot name a single game which has had MP added in a sequel, that has not had some glaring fault or another.

Ed130:So instead of diverting time, money and resources form the Tomb Raider game they are diverting time, money and resources from a dev team that hasn't done multiplayer before and is already working on a game that's got allot more interest than a reboot.

GENIUS!

glass is half full time...

If the next game after thief 4 is another deus ex..and the next deus ex will have multiplayer (extending game lifetime&online passes-publishers are seriosuly looking at this)...then eidos montreal is going to do a test run on a game that is already doomed to be rubbish.

I'm not going to put any faith into the idea that because there's 1 team working on singleplayer and 1 one multiplayer that the existance of multiplayer won't affect the quality of singleplayer. First, no game ever made should NEED multiplayer, it singleplayer should be good enough to be able to stand on it's own without needing a multiplayer thrown in. Second, having 2 teams instead of 1 will mean that both teams have less people in each team working on either part of the game to keep the costs down. Third, having 2 teams working on only 1 part of the game will in all likelyhood result in an the "left hand doesn't know what the right is doing" situation, where the 2 modes have poor balancing and make it more difficult to adapt to the gameplay between modes due to poor communication between the designers.

I dont think you need to call it JUST yet many good single player games had still had the (annoying) addition of multiplayer with (theoretically) no impact on their single player, I don't see why this game nessicaryly has to be the exception (and I'm still optimistic)

its just the very presance of multipalyer and EVERY SINGLE FUCKING GAME seemingly having it that makes me roll my eyes

you would be amazed how many people want games with MP. many people refuse to buy a game because of lack of MP or coop. they think that MP gives the game more replayability then the SP. i have read throughout the net that some dint even get deus ex HR because it had no MP. this usually shows that kiddies these days dont want to play by them selfs anymore.

I don't see how multiplayer is a detriment to singleplayer. Nothing to suggest they didn't make the singleplayer game they wanted to make. Regardless of how good or bad multiplayer will be, it's its own thing.

you would be amazed how many people want games with MP. many people refuse to buy a game because of lack of MP or coop. they think that MP gives the game more replayability then the SP. i have read throughout the net that some dint even get deus ex HR because it had no MP. this usually shows that kiddies these days dont want to play by them selfs anymore.

are there honestly that many stupid people in existance?..honestly? if they are like that why should devs bother with single player at all if all thease "people" want to do is shoot each other *grumble*

Sacman:Heh, here's a good idea, get a team most famous for a game that prided itself on not having multiplayer to make the multiplayer component of a game that shouldn't have multiplayer to begin with...<.<

Square Enix owns both studios, it's possible that the new Tomb Raider is using the Deus Ex: HR engine. Since most likely the sequel to Deus Ex:HR will include MP, they took the portion of the team that developed the MP part of the next Deus Ex and put it in Tomb Raider as well.

Well actually, don;t quote me, but if I remember correctly, Deus Ex used the same engine as Tomb Raider Underworld and Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light... or at least a modified version... and chances are they're sticking with the same engine for the new Tomb Raider too...<.<

I have zero interest in this game. The more that comes out about it, the less interested I am. I was also really turned off by the PC Gamer preview. I typically do not play MP either. The only time I do is when a game is made with MP in mind (L4D, Battlefield, things like that) and even then, I mostly devote time to my SP game collection.

That said, this game could have some cool MP. I wouldn't mind a scavenger hunt mode where people are racing each other to find treasure. That could be cool. They could inhibit each other with traps or special abilities that are character specific, or have abilities that give them an edge in some situation. Perhaps Lara can run a little faster while someone else can climb faster or jump a bit further. You could use this same idea and have animal hunts. The match creator (because we all know it will be P2P because that works awesome all the time, right) can define a certain weapon to be used and a specific animal. You can even have some of the people play as other predatory animals in the competition. You then have the prey spawn in a random area that is specifically hard to get to so the characters have to use some of those aforementioned special movement abilities to get to the prey faster (hopefully) than others will.

All of this is, in my mind, very specific MP that would make sense in the context of the game. It's a Tomb Raider game so scavenger hunts and animal hunting makes a lot of sense. All of that said, I'm sure it will be some tacked on contrived MP where people are killing each other. I mean, I never played the Uncharted MP, but I recall reading it was just like Deathmatch bullshit.

OH MY GOD HOW COULD THEY DO THAT, THAT'S SO FUCKING STUPID! *ragerageragerage*

In all seriousness, I think people should maybe just wait and see how it turns out. Sure, the prospect of MP in a Lara Croft game can be a bit scary, but we've actually not seen anything from it, so it's a bit rash to bash it like this.

Next up multiplayer in Kingdom Hearts HD and Kingdom Hearts 3! They surly never don...oh wait. *looks at 358/2 Days*But then again that wasn't as bad as how the Bioshock 2 multiplayer was. Seriously I'm not liking the time that companies are putting into multiplayer when most people would rather play a good single player campaign. It's getting harder to find games that don't have multiplayer tacked on.

Honestly I have a ton of friends from work that only play multiplayer games including mmos eve, planetside 2 tor, arma 2, battlefield and cod half of them only bought uncharted 3 and gears 3 because they have multiplayer and competitive pvp. A few of them also believe that pvp or multiplayer requires a to more skill then single player. Now looking at that mind set and how ea has been throwing multiplayer into everything and now square is finally seeing the reason to is why this is happening more casual and competitive players will play this game just cause it has multiplayer and it will honestly sell more that's the point even if its a first for the team they will learn adapt and continue to make better multiplayer for the future sadly this is where the industry is headed and you can thank 2 things for it one casuals 2 cod cause honestly it started this. You can complain as much as you want pc gamers as I know it's more the fact there are more casual and competitive gamers in the world then hard core and therefore catering to both sides yields the most profit.

I dont think you need to call it JUST yet many good single player games had still had the (annoying) addition of multiplayer with (theoretically) no impact on their single player, I don't see why this game nessicaryly has to be the exception (and I'm still optimistic)

its just the very presance of multipalyer and EVERY SINGLE FUCKING GAME seemingly having it that makes me roll my eyes

It's not so much that the game couldn't be good, it's that every flaw it has will in my mind be something they could gave fixed had they spent the time and resources working on that rather then the unnecessary multiplayer.

Granted, if the game looks decent then I may end up giving it a chance, but considering that I am not that excited by what I have seen so far (too many mechanics that I know will irritate me) the addition of something I have zero interest in such as multiplayer is only going to put me off more.

But then again that wasn't as bad as how the Bioshock 2 multiplayer was.

The sad thing is that it actually had some very good ideas, but they didn't get some of the more basic aspects right.

Their version of Capture the flag with one team defending a little sister and the other team trying to steal her was an excellent idea, especially when the defending team had a Big Daddy as well. They then screwed it up by making it so she gets reset upon a capture which completely broke the atmosphere of the game.

Finding the vials of ADAM for extra XP was a very nice touch as well, as was hacking turrets and turning ammo machines into traps.

But there were so many other problems, especially lag and the weapon balancing.

Thief 4 is still in the works. And I doubt they're using much of the actual team, anyway. They're not going to need any writers, art directors, or... well, anything really other than a few guys, it would seem.